Wrong Holiday

 Have I mentioned my Terry Francona PC on this blog yet?

For a while I accumulated Francona cards on a whim, picking up a couple here and there when shopping at places like Cardbarrel and BaseballCardStore (rip). Evetually I decided to add him to my PC player list. Terry wasn't a star(rarely even a starter), played in the 1980s, and retired before there were 20+ sets a year. I thought a Francona career collection would be fairly simple and affordable.

Hasn't quite turned out that way. I still need a couple basic singles:

1982 - Donruss, Fleer, Topps
1983 - Donruss, Fleer, Topps
1984 - Donruss, Fleer, Topps
1985 - Donruss, Fleer, Topps
1986 - Donruss, Fleer, Topps
1987 - Donruss, Fleer, Topps
1988 - Score, Topps
1989 - Score, Topps, Upper Deck
1990 - Score, Topps, Upper Deck

Then there's O-Pee-Chee (need 1982, and 1987), Leaf (need 1985), and the Traded/Tiffany/Traded Tiffany sets (need most of those.) I might try to pick up his minor league cards but I am not messing with all those Brewers police issues. 

I don't have any cards of Terry's dad Tito Francona - unless you count the 1985 Topps Father/Son single. Might try to pick up some Titos, too. 

Father / son duos have been on my mind lately as I've been cataloging my card collection. We're all familiar with the Griffeys, the Bondses, the Hulls, the Currys, and so on. In recent years the McCaffreys, Guerreros, Bichettes, Witts, and Tkachuks have been in the spotlight. 

Cross-sport father-son duos have piqued my interest as well. 

Pat and Patrick Mahomes are the obvious ones. But did you know Wayne Gretzky's son played minor league baseball?

Popeye and Seth Jones are inteteresting. I may have mentioned this story before, but here it goes again. While the elder Jones was playing for the Denver Nuggets his son Seth saw their arena-mates the Avalanche playing hockey and took to the sport immediately. Popeye sought out the Avs' captain Joe Sakic for assistance on getting Seth started as a hockey player, and... 

It worked out pretty well. So, to summarize: Iconic hockey great's son = minor league ballplayer. Journeyman basketball player's son = NHL All-Star, Olympian, and Stanley Cup Champion. 

The sports world is full of countless father / son combinations. We’re even seeing the rare father / daughter combo once in a blue moon.

Some bloodlines are known immediately, like when the top of the MLB Draft includes Matt Holliday's kid and Reggie Willits's kid. Some sneak up on you. Have you ever seen an athlete with a name that sounds vaguely familiar and thought.. I wonder if they're related to that player I remember as a kid? 

There’s also the inverse of that- like when you come across a player from the past and connect them to a current star.

I've got some old WLAF singles saved for nostalgia and curiosity; no one but me is going to have any interest in 35 year-old cards from a long-dead league. Except .. looking closer, I noticed something. A quarterback with a familiar last name.

I flipped it over, saw that Mark Maye was from North Carolina, and learned that I have a card of Drake's dad. Which reminds me - I've also got a junk wax-era card of Jared Goff's dad. (And you probably do, too.) 

🏈🏈🏈🏈🏈🏈🏈🏈🏈🏈🏈🏈🏈

The sports card portion of this post is over but I thought I'd summarize my dating app experience since this is Love Day and all (hail Lord Huggington!)

I was on Hinge for about six weeks, and was well-prepared for the lack of likes and interest. Nearly all of the testimonials I read from regular guys said that dating apps are "pay to win" and "will destroy your self-esteem" Ha! You assume I have any to begin with!

 

But yeah, it was unproductive to say the least. I did not pay for a subscription and felt no need to do so. Is that why I managed a mere two likes on my profile pics and one like on my prompt answers? I doubt it, but who knows. 

My initial plan was to feed the algorithm by scrolling through profiles and clicking the heart next to any pics or prompt answers that I vibed with. If I could think of something to say I'd leave a comment with my like. Probably 'liked' at least a hundred things and commented 15 times. 

There was one woman who said she loved Ted Lasso and asked if the reader is a Ted or a Roy. I left a nice long comment stating I'm a Roy and .. she liked my profile. We had a connection! Except.. when I followed up it was gone. She must have unfollowed me immediately . Maybe because I have kids?

I think I mentioned that local taco-lover I was on the fence about? I did message her, and .. nothing. For the most part I tried to stay local. But 'local' to me also means New York City, and.. whoa. Sooo many women way over my head. I usually don't care - they're all Type A with "growth mindset" listed among their green flags. But there was one woman who didn't have any corporate speak in her profile, didn't seem like an influencer type. Still way out of my league, but I took a shot because...

Yeeaahh.... all I got was a new crush out of that. And obviously she didn't reply. 

I didn't need to see any more. 

Happy Love Day everyone!



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Black Refractor Break

When was the last time you looked up the value of your cards? Not because you wanted to sell or trade something, but a card in your PC? Did you check recent sales on eBay, or look up prices on Beckett? 

Does anyone still use Beckett anymore?

I'm in the middle of cataloging my collection on TCDB (I'm about 1/3 finished) and I've got room for one card in my higher-end hits/relics/autos box. Can't fit a relic so I shopped for low-numbered parallels of players I like, and/or color-matching refractors. And that's when I realize that the 'hit' I was looking for was hiding in my lower tier box all along. 

The card I was interested in was a Topps Chrome Black Refractor parallel from the early 2000s. And it was priced much higher than I expected. I crossed that card off my want list and started looking elsewhere. And then I had a thought. I have some black refrators.... I wonder if they're worth over $20?

This one is not a $20 card (recently sold for $11.99). But it color matches and I'm a big fan of the 2011 Topps design.

I thought that Peavy would be my cheapest Black Refracor but that ended up being Tyrod Taylor:

A rookie card of a still-active QB... and it only sells for about $5? Fine with me, I wasn't planning to sell it anyway. 

Here's another QB from the 2011 rookie class. I knew this was a $100 card years ago, back when he was still playing. Recent sales are all over the place - anywhere from $40 to $120.
 

Let's go back a few years for another Carolina Panther:

This Steve Smith Sr. card was sitting in my non-PC box of football, where I keep anything that's not a set filler or high end card. I figured it was about $5 or so, as Smith is not yet a Hall of Famer and 2003 chrome black refractors are serial numbered to 599 (as opposed to /100 or /299 numbering for the 2011 edition.)

Ah, but it's older! I guess that explains recent sales in the $15-25 range. 

How about a legit first-ballot HOFer and league MVP?

If Smith is around $20, then Tomlinson should be somewhere around $30.. yes?

Nope. The LT sells for around $100! 

Does hockeydude have any black refractor hockey cards?

He does not. Topps only made black refractor parallels in 2001-02 and 2002-03. The 2002-03s were numbered to 100 while the ‘01-02 cards were numbered to 50. Even common players are $15 and up, with some Hall of Famers selling for over $300. Which isn't bad at all if you compare the scarcity to their football counterparts (someone got a steal on this Adam Oates card) 

However, I do have a couple more to show off. These were sitting in my baseball boxes. Again, I assumed they were $5-10 cards, max. 

Here's another guy who hasn't made the Hall of Fame yet, but might soon:

These 2006 Topps Chrome black refractors are numbered to 549. King Felix here just sold for... under $10 delivered. Lol, that's not far off from what I had originally thought. 

But here's the hidden gem. This is the one that slid into a one-touch and grabbed that open space in my box of higher-end hits.

Recent sales of Cabrera black refractors range from $215 to almost $500 ... for 2004 black refractors. The only sale of a 2006 that I saw was for about $70. Which isn't far off from what his rookie card sells for.  

Looks like I'll have to make room for two more higher-value cards. Or maybe I should cash them all in for a single $250-300 card?!? 

Do you have any Black Refractors in your collection? Have you recently discovered a card in your PC that was worth far more than you expected?

Back to cataloging...see you in a couple weeks :)

Thanks for reading!


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A long post before a long break

Over the past two months I've added loads of new cards to my collection and thought of several blog post ideas. I've just lacked the time to write about any of them. And so I wanted to start the new year off with a relatively long post about my card collection, blog, and goals for 2026. 

Like a lot of long-time collectors, I definitely feel like I've been priced out of the hobby. 2025 was a horrible year personally but it was a once-in-a-generation opportunity to reshape my collection. If hobby box prices were reasonable (no monopolies, no breakers, etc.) I could see myself sauntering into my LCS and leaving with 5 or 6 boxes, single cards, supplies.. you name it. Instead, I bought one hobby box. I hadn't bought a hobby box in years - and I'll probably never do it again. 

 

Retail has been my go-to for about a decade, though it's frustrating to have your options limited by whatever basic products you can find at Target. $20 blasters were always a cheap way to get your rip fix; if the box is a dud, at least it didn't damage your wallet. But those $20 blasters are now $35 for the same amount of hits. If card shows were a thing around here -- and dealers brought quarter and dollar boxes -- I'd only go to Target for home essentials and whatnot. 

In fact I go to Target even less because Barnes & Noble has a better selection of blasters, they're closer, and I have more incentive to shop there because my daughters read books and I get rewards coupons. They even have hockey cards!

As any savvy collector will tell you, ripping boxes is a waste of money. It's better to just buy the singles you want. I did a mix of that in Q4 2025: some from the 'smart' side of the ledger and some from the 'foolish' side. Spending over $200 on Series One of Upper Deck hockey? Dumb! I could have bought the base set and the top rookies for roughly that amount. I still need about 40 of the 250 base cards and I didn't pull the Ivan Demidov RC out of hobby or retail (also - hobby doesn't have relics or autos anymore? what's the chase - low numbered parallels? ) 

Also on the 'foolish' ledger - I spent nearly $300 on a Jim Palmer second-year card that I could have bought for $30 raw. It's hard to explain this to a traditional collector/slab skeptic, especially with reports of grading malfeasance from PSA (which is now a monopoly!) popping up more frequently than ever. In general, it's a terrible time to invest in any type of graded cards - PSA, SGC, or especially BGS. 

But that train left the station a looong time ago, and I've never had the extra room in my budget to shape my seemingly disparate slabs into an actual theme. With each passing year, my interest in new cards and current players dims, allowing me to focus on players I grew up watching and 'golden era' legends whose legacies are etched in stone. 

It's exhausting trying to speculate on current players - which ones will succeed immediately? Which ones will fail spectacularly? Which ones will improve at a expected rate for their sport, but the hobby hypes them up soo much that by the time they reach the potential everyone knew they had, investors had already given up because they weren't immediately amazing?

I seriously considered picking up a Connor Bedard Young Guns RC last summer for about $200. Would have been a smart investment, but collecting current players just isn't a priority for me anymore. I buy new product for fun. I invest in vintage because I've made way too many mistakes selling too soon on recent stars. The Alex Ovechkin SP Authentic sale was amazing, but I still left money on the table. 

And I'm okay with that. I've learned to let go of the mistakes and forgive myself for selling cards I shouldn't have. This. Is. A. Hobby. Collect what makes you happy, not what makes you money. 

For me, that means one of three things: set building, team PCs, and vintage. There are some players(most of them retired) that still ping my antennae, but that's less of a priority at the moment.
 

Team PCs are the cheapest, and it's where I've spent the most time over the past year and a half. I'm running out of room for more Red Sox, Packers, Devils, and Whalers.. yet that doesn't stop me from hitting Sportlots or Beckett for new stuff. My final purchase of 2025 was from Rich N' Deals. I was lured in by a 30% off coupon, filled my cart with everything I wanted, and had about $70 worth of singles ready to order. But the coupon was only good for $100+ purchases. I needed to find a "free" card. 

Dennis will be happy with my choice here: 

I've got a couple low-end rookie cards of the holy pitching trinity of the 21st century: Kershaw, Scherzer, Verlander*. None of them were Topps until now. I also picked up a Joe Flacco relic to get me just over the $100 minimum. I wasn't foolish enough to spend $30 on a $10 card alone - even if it was technically free. 

For a brief moment many months ago, I considered picking up a slabbed Bowman Chrome auto of Verlander - until I searched prices on eBay. Oof. This is why I can’t collect current players.

*Side note/mini-rant: why are the HOF vote totals for borderline pitchers exploding this year? We don't need to put Andy Pettitte or Felix Hernandez in the Hall to fill a quota - just wait for these guys (and Greinke). 

I don't want to spend too much time discussing my vintage graded card collection here; you'll see many of the cards in my upcoming Top Ten By Position series anyhow. It has been a lot of fun selling certain slabs and streamlining the collection. My graded card carrying case fits exactly 144 slabs, so I've named my PSA project "The 144". 4 Sharp Coners consignment has helped me essentially trade in unneeded vintage for 'bucket list' rookie cards and high-grade copies of legends that were missing from my collection. The Position series will serve as a checklist for who I'm still missing. Should be fun!

On that note, I'm going to take a break from blogging for the majority of January. I'm currently undertaking a major cataloging project that will prepare me for the blog series (set to debut in February or March) and allow me to trade on TCDB so I can fill some sets. Box and binder space in my collection is very limited but I do have room for one more row of boxes on my shelf. 

Looks like I'll be adding more Topps baseball and Upper Deck hockey sets to my collection this year.  

Of course the real set building focus remains my 1956 Topps set. I plan to complete this in 2026, for several reasons: 

-my mom got me started on this and I want to finish it while she is still alive (her health is declining faster than she wants to admit) 

-my kids are going to start planning for college soon, and I will either need to sell the set to fund their higher education or, at the very least, stop spending money on myself

-it's the 70th anniversary of this fantastic set, the 75th anniversary of Topps baseball cards in general, and my 40th year of collecting!

🎵Memmm-ries 🎵

As the year progresses, I will plan some festivities for these occasions. For now, my focus will be on the Top Ten By Position series - and possibly a post on collecting(or not collecting) bad guys before that. 

Thanks for reading!



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Cardsmas Haul

One more post to close out this crappy year. 

I did end up getting some cards for Christmas* - two megaboxes of Topps Heritage and a megabox of UD hockey. (Did I pick them out myself, pay for them, and wrap them? perhaps...)

*the only Christmas card I received from outside the family arrived yesterday. D's friends have sent photocards in the past but I guess they don't see a reason to send one here without her. 

I don't know why I took a picture of the packs but not the cards. There wasn't anything great in here - I already had one of the Young Guns rookies and didn't pull any notable Devils or superstar inserts. Just slowly plugging away at the base set as I've been doing for 35 years with Upper Deck hockey. 

One of my Goals For 2026 will be to fill in the missing years in my UD base set collection. I stopped after 2015-16 and didn't resume until 2022-23. There are probably some Extended sets I'm missing, too. 

Topps Heritage might be the best value of all recent sports card sets. I got a huge stack of cards with shiny parallels, a couple inserts, and some SP's for less than the cost of a single megabox of Topps Chrome basketball. 272 of these, or 42 of these? Heritage all day! 

This stack is going to keep me busy for a while. And so will this book my brother in law gifted me:

He also got me a compilation of sci-fi stories, which I will enjoy almost as much. And one single card:

This was a very cool surprise. I asked if he met Mike Eruzione, but he didn't - this was an eBay purchase. If you haven't seen Miracle I highly reccomend it - even if you're not a hockey fan.

 

Thanks for reading and Happy New Year! Here's to a less shitty 2026!! 🎉



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Topps Holiday Christmas Ornament Thingy

Merry Christmas everyone! I hope you're having a happy holiday celebration with your families and not driving two hours to your in-laws like I'm doing. Can I still call them in-laws? I'm not married anymore ?:/ 

This is the first year that I'm in charge of Christmas, and I definitely spent a lot on my girls. Next year we'll be a bit more frugal. I also spent a little bit on myself, with some high-end singles that I'll show off soon. 

And there's at least one unwrapped sports card gift for me...

I spied a Topps Holiday ornament while shopping for my daughters and thought it would be a nice capper to the Advent calendar. Little did I know how badly I'd need a proper finale. Yeesh. 

Inside this decorative ball (which was far too heavy to stay on my tree) is a tray holding 52 cards:

I'll add the base singles together with my calendar haul and recap everything this weekend. Meanwhile, here are the ornament exclusive parallels: 

The blue ones look better IMO. Nice to get a Bregman even though he's definitely not coming back to Boston (not that we need him) I might ship the Machado out to Fuji once I open the rest of my Christmas cards. 

There were no Nice List inserts (good, I'm tired of them) nor any other insert, but there was a card flipped over in the pack:

Hmm, I wonder why this was .... oooohhh

Holiday image variation of last year's big rookie free agent!!! This has got to be a $15-20 card, no?

No. Not at all. It's basically a common. Shouldn't the base Sasaki RC sell for $2+??

I am woefully out of touch with card values. Which is fine; I only need to know them when buying graded vintage anyhow. The Advent calendar and the Ornament were fun to open and that's what matters.

Did you open any sports card packs or boxes this Christmas? Did you receive them as gifts, or did you buy them yourself (like I did)? 

Thanks for reading!


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